71 Ginger
71
Ginger
We were tired, satiated, lost on the moon.
We’d made love all night, almost without speaking. Or not speaking in words, anyway. Just with looks, touches, and sighs. My head on his chest, following his muscles down to his belly button with my fingertip, touching the tattoo of that little bee that symbolized life for him. I saw goose bumps appear on his flesh.
“You could stay.”
It was just a murmur.
I sat up and looked at him. “Are you serious?”
“Why not, Ginger?”
“What would I do here?”
He wavered, doubted. “I don’t know. We’ll figure it out.”
“Do you realize what you’re asking me to do?” I started putting on my clothes, but he stopped me.
“I just mean, like, for now, dammit.”
“Why don’t you come with me?”
“Because we’re already here. And I have a job.”
“Seriously? For years, you’ve been going from place to place, laying your head wherever, and it never entered your mind that you could stay in London for a while? And now you’re asking me to stay here. Far from my family. Far from everything, when you know I want to try to make my publishing career happen. And I will. You can’t do this to me.”
I was crying again. The whole day had been a roller coaster, down and up and back down again. Full of vertigo. Sad every time I looked at him. But also angry, disappointed, tender, unsure, yearning.
“You’re right.” He shook his head.
“Of course I’m right,” I whispered, but I wasn’t sure.
“Plus, we don’t even know if it would work.”
“Yeah. I guess.”
“We should get some sleep. It’s late.”
Night after night, we’d stayed up late talking, laughing, getting drunk, burning the midnight oil in the bed that the sun shone on in the morning, but now, because I had to fly out the next morning, it was late .
Rhys turned off the light, and I lay beside him. His body was close to mine, hugging me. I couldn’t stop thinking of how he said I could stay. And I couldn’t breathe. Why did he have to say that? Why, why, why? That wasn’t supposed to be an option. I shouldn’t have been thinking about it.
“Ginger.”
“What?”
I could feel him tense up.
“I don’t talk to my father because…he’s not my father. And she’s not my mother either. Neither of them are my parents. I found out by accident that I’d been adopted. They never told me. And then stuff happened. Stuff that can’t be undone. Words that can’t be unspoken. That still hurt.”
“Rhys, I’m so sorry.”
“I just wanted to tell you because you’re my best friend. And you always will be. It doesn’t matter what happens. Ever. It’s us on the moon.”
I turned and looked for his face in the darkness. I stroked it with my fingers until I reached his lips and traced their perfect curves. “Always. I promise you that.”
I kissed him slowly and sweetly. A kiss that tasted of goodbye.